The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for effecting radiation dosage planning to be used in rendering radiation treatment to a selected anatomical portion of an animal body, for example, the human prostate gland.
The prior art teaches treatment of localized malignancies with radiation emitted from a discrete radioactive source placed near the malignancy, such treatment commonly referred to as brachytherapy. Since the radioactive sources used in such treatment may constitute a hazard to the personnel administering same, apparatus is now commercially available which allows for the positioning of the radioactive source and the treatment therewith in the patient with minimum radiation exposure to the medical personnel rendering the treatment. Such apparatus allows the positioning and treatment with a radioactive source in the patient after the person administering the treatment moves away from the operating room in which the patient is being treated. Because the radioactive source is loaded into the patient after the medical personnel leave the area, such treatment delivery devices are generally referred to as after-loading devices.
The most recent commercially available radiation delivery devices in the after-loading category utilize a single high dose rate (HDR) source positioned at a plurality of preselected dwell positions within the anatomical part being treated for preselected dwell times. One such radiation delivery HDR after-loading device is commercially available from Nucletron Corporation of Columbia, Md. and is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,084,001.
The positioning of the HDR source requires a radiation treatment plan which specifies the locations of the HDR source and the time period or dwell time at each such location at which the HDR source is to reside during treatment of the patient. Conventionally, medical personnel place a number of guide tubes or hollow needles for carrying the HDR source into the anatomical area to be treated, take X-rays of the needles in place and then manually digitize the X-ray data utilizing a mouse or courser for input to a dosage planning computer associated with the radiation delivery unit. A disadvantage of this conventional approach is the time required for such data digitization and entry. Data entry time has been found to be on the order of one hour. This delayed time period forces the delivery system to be in place with the patient for a prolonged time prior to actual administration of the treatment radiation dosages. Additionally, in the prior art, there is no provision for on-the-spot adjustments to the delivery system and/or its dosage plan using an interactive visual data system.
There is therefore seen to be a need for an apparatus and method for rapidly, reliably and interactively generating a radiation dosage plan based on real time data associated with a preselected placement of a radiation source delivery system with respect to the anatomical portion to be treated.